The feeling of incompetence peaks when bringing that first baby home from the hospital, and peaks again (how is it even possible?) when that baby is learning to live life on his own. In both seasons I wished upon a star (or prayed) that I would always know the right thing to say and do. No mistakes for me, please.
Not knowing rankles, kid!
But then I remember that God’s strength is made perfect in weakness.
And I remember the horrible discovery that I made when I asked my 10-year-old daughter to select a book from our more than adequate library. Reader, she could not. I discovered that, while every child needs a librarian to hand over a book that is exactly what she wants, that child does not need a librarian every time she needs a book. I learned the hard way that always knowing just the right book for my daughter, and feeling the deep satisfaction when my guesses are affirmed, was not in her best interest. Why bother thinking if someone else does it for me?
That event causes me to view my inadequacies differently now. I can help them find a good book, but I don’t know how to help them find a job. My children don’t always know what to do, and I sometimes feel incompetent to help them. Sometimes I do know, but in rare insight realize it’s not for me to tell them. Sometimes I haven’t a clue what they should do next or how. And yet, God’s strength is made perfect in my weakness. God knows everything, every answer, but he tells us to search for wisdom. He leads us in discovery, more often than not. I can imitate that.
Sometimes the right answer (I hate it) is “go look it up.”
Sometimes we discover why together. (Note to self: “Have you considered” is better than “You need to”)
And sometimes the answer is “I have no idea, but seek the Lord, and he will give you everything you need.”
Just know, kid, that you do not need all the answers.
Preparing for Adulthood, Lately
Preparing for Adulthood is a category of post on my blog– as our children grow older, we are regularly examining how we are preparing them for independent thought, actions, and life. If we micromanage too much during this stage, we don’t help them when we they no longer live with us. In fact, we handicap them. Today I’m thinking about some things we started years ago but we can see clearly today that they have been helpful. I’m sure there are other things, but we’ll look at three in this post.
Babysitting
One of the ways I want to prepare my children for adulthood is making sure that they spend time around young children. Because I don’t have more than three children pretty close together in age, and because we don’t live near younger relatives that they see frequently, I’ve had to intentionally create time with tinies. One of the ways I did that is inviting young mamas with babies and toddlers to my house after school or during our lunch break. When my children were younger, they naturally wanted to play with the little children while we visited. As they got older and started developing their own interests, I used my ministry as a way for my children to earn money. I offered to pay them to babysit while the mama and I visited. We talk ahead of time about how we will keep children entertained when they come. Laurel babysits for our small group, and the parents take turns paying her for her time.
Working as a family in children’s ministry at church is another way to learn about children. Practically, David didn’t do a lot of babysitting, but he worked with us in kids ministry at church, and that gave him a lot of valuable experience as well as a way to give his time to others. Because we’ve had a lot of young children to our house, he is comfortable around them and they like him. I tell him that he’ll be a good daddy, if God gives him wife and child! Plenty of new fathers have never held a baby before their own, and they do just fine; still, I’d rather give him the idea that fatherhood is something enjoyable to look forward to, and take away some of the mystery of caring for children.
The girls babysit regularly. I’ve been thankful for the opportunities God has given them to babysit, not merely because they can earn money, but also because they are learning valuable lessons about child development that will be helpful should God give them a family some day. I signed them up for a babysitting/ CPR course. We talk about strategies and ways to entertain children. We troubleshoot ways to guide children who don’t want to cooperate. Even for those who do not love babysitting, I see that having young children around is worthwhile.
Summer Camp Work
The last three summers, David has worked at Ironwood Christian Camp in their Leadership Live program. Last summer, Bethel worked there as well. These high school students are a part of the operations staff (yard crew, store crew, dishwashing crew, etc.) and in exchange, get to be a part of a really cool Christian ministry to children and teens. One of the reasons I’m enthusiastic about this opportunity is that it gives our kids a chance to work hard with other Christian teenagers who do odd things like ask about what they’re reading in the Bible, or pray together without an adult telling them to. They are learning problem resolution, building friendships, working hard, and the joy of serving the Lord with others.
One of the things our kids have mentioned is that, because of homeschooling, and because we move often, the continuity of working at the same place each summer with other Christian kids has been wonderful. When I asked David what helped prepare him for college life the most, he mentioned his summers working away from home.
Long-Distance Friendships
I think because of our traveling in the military, we’ve been more permissive than many of our friends about connecting with friends online. Every time we move, we leave friends behind. For our children, these long -distance friendships are a lifeline each time we move, and we want to encourage them as much as is appropriate. One guideline we generally follow is that online friendships take a backseat to the new in-person friendships that God has given us. So, if we’ve invited a family over for dinner, then we usually like our kids to be a part of the meal! We encourage them to work on building new friendships in our new location, but we recognize that the old friendships provide stability, and need not be neglected. We try to do the same thing we are asking of our children, so we know it’s not always easy. We don’t always get it right, and we are learning.
A note about friendships of the opposite sex. We’ve not forbidden these, but we feel very strongly that these friendships should develop slowly in teen years, alongside of our families, along with other healthy relationships, and without family teasing. They don’t date in high school– that would be silly. But we do encourage them to build friendships, to consider that these friendships are good ways to learn what we value, to learn how to communicate better, and how to solve problems. We monitor their accounts. In general, we believe that as children demonstrate responsibility, we keep giving them freedom. At this time, we don’t remove all freedom at the slightest hiccup, but we will give more or less oversight as they grow.
I’ve observed that teasing about boyfriends/ girlfriends tends to push relationships either too fast, or to bury them underground and hidden. When these friendships are treated as a normal part of responsible living, my hope is that our children will be relatively open about them. I’d much rather keep them in the realm of conversation– What’s going on in _____’s life? What are the things that you admire about that person? etc. There’s room I think for both privacy and a little teasing, and perhaps different personalities would respond differently, but I still think keeping these relationships out of bounds for relentless teasing is a good idea.
It’s an odd feeling to be allowing more freedom, but it’s also an exciting time that does lead us to regularly bring our needs to the throne of grace on behalf of our children. We are asking God to build our relationships with them, and draw our children close to himself, that they would know the joy of walking in the spirit.
What are some of the things you are doing or wish you had done to prepare your children for adulthood? I’d love to hear your stories.
Growing Wise Adults Is Not Safe
If you set out to teach your child to obey without question, the danger is that you might succeed. They might be safe children, but they also may grow up vulnerable to abuse and peer pressure and spiritual error because they learned their lesson too well.
If, instead, you want your children to become thoughtful, curious Christians who quickly obey but also test words against the standard of God’s Word, you may succeed but create a headache for yourself in the process.
That’s because children who want to know why often ask YOU why. We actually want them to question everyone else, not our own values and rules. But the more successful we are at teaching our children to be godly Bereans, the more they will turn their questions our way. I’ll warn you, I’ve not found it comfortable or pretty.
Curious children ferret out our inconsistencies and our poor reasoning. They find our weak spots and probe until we squirm. They learn wisdom by making choices in the grey areas, and their grey areas aren’t always ones we agree are grey. Such children can embarrass us with their questions and freedom. They send us back to the Scripture and our knees. Thankfully, we have a Holy Spirit who specializes in teaching and directing. We can trust him as we teach as best as we can and wait on his timing for the results.
Perhaps we will find that the process of scrutiny and growth from our children is one of the great blessings of the parenting journey.
Allowing Children to Choose Unwisely
I’ve always known that the ability to control my children’s behavior lasts for a relatively short time. I can make my children brush their teeth, but at some point, they will have to decide whether they will continue to brush their teeth each day.
I’d like my children to practice making wise choices while they are still in my home, but that skill demands that I allow them to make unwise choices while they are still in my home.
What choices will I allow? My friends know my girls rarely keep their shoes on. We’ve lived in warm climates for most of their lives, but even so, they wear sandals or go without shoes when other normal people have shoes on. Same goes for jackets. For some reason, they don’t like long sleeved shirts, and are often coat-less when others around them are bundled up.
I’ve let them shirk their piano and trumpet practicing for a time. I do ask them about their goals for learning piano, and sometimes I make them practice, but I don’t do that every day, weeks on end. I acknowledge that I am forcing lessons on them for a time, but I’ve also been honest that without their personal investment, they are largely wasting their own time. I hope they will trust me that they may be glad in the future that they pursued musical knowledge.
I don’t make them fold their clothes neatly in their drawers.
I let them waste time on the computer.
I let them buy way too much candy (with their hard earned money) at the grocery store.
I don’t make them read their Bibles every day.
I don’t always make them share! With three children that can cause problems because my children will sometimes come to me and ask why I’m allowing someone to be selfish! I explain that in order to teach a child to choose rightly, I sometimes allow them to choose wrongly. In these cases, I’m reminded that the Holy Spirit continues to work in the hearts of my children, even when I’m not forcing an external action.
What are the choices that you allow your children to make? I’ve found this a helpful exercise for me, as I’ve had my thinking stretched as my children grow older. I would have been a terrible mother of teenagers when my children were under four! Truly, God gives wisdom for each season, when we ask.
Sometimes I’m recognizing that my child is choosing between two good choices: Should they talk with their friends at church (building Christian friendships is a good thing) or talk with a visiting teen (loving the outsider is also a good thing). I might not know which area the Holy Spirit is touching in my child’s life, and I need to be cautious not to make assumptions.
Some choices I don’t allow. Some choices I’ll allow for a time and then intervene. Sometimes I’ll talk about choices and see what my children are thinking, express my concerns, and then back off. Sometimes I’ve determined not to intervene at all, even for a choice I wish they would make differently.
Part of allowing choices is something we learn practically as parents. We are working ourselves out of a job, as my mom says. We HAVE to let them start making choices on their own; otherwise they will be stunted when do finally leave our homes. Allowing choices is important for spiritual decisions as well. Notice how Paul describes God’s dealing with the Corinthian church. There is a period of time that God allows for them to deal with their own sin. But God will eventually intervene. (For if we would judge ourselves, we would not be judged. But when we are judged, we are chastened by the Lord, that we may not be condemned with the world. 1 Corinthians 11:31-32)
The very idea of wisdom cannot be separated from the freedom of choices, and learning by doing. As much as we think we would like directives, God’s ways are much better. God allows us the space to risk making mistakes as we try to live in a way that pleases him. Making errors may be less a failure than simply part of growing! Learning to live the Christian walk wisely, including learning to parent, by trial and error is challenging but satisfying.
I also like the Bible idea that the word of God exposes our motives and plans. Perhaps part of our discipleship is allowing the choices, but then helping our children evaluate those choices afterward. (For the word of God is living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the division of soul and spirit, and of joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. Hebrews 4:12)
What biblical principles do you see regarding choices we make?
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